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| Re: Who's stolen land are you living on? Re: (List) Re: HAPPY COLUMBUS DAY!!!!!!!!!! (1909702) | |||
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Re: Who's stolen land are you living on? Re: (List) Re: HAPPY COLUMBUS DAY!!!!!!!!!! |
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Posted by Avid Reader on Tue Oct 11 12:23:39 2022, in response to Re: Who's stolen land are you living on? Re: (List) Re: HAPPY COLUMBUS DAY!!!!!!!!!!, posted by BILLBKLYN on Tue Oct 11 10:47:33 2022. They were just passing through at the time!Tour of The Remnants of Dutch New Amsterdam Minuit (and his predecessor, Verhulst) was already authorized by the Dutch West India Company to settle any disputes with local Native American tribes over trading and land rights. Soon after his arrival, Minuit entered into a transaction with one or more local tribes over the rights to Manhattan. No original title deed remains, and the main documentary evidence is a Dutch West India Company internal communication from late 1626 that includes the following (translated): Yesterday the ship the Arms of Amsterdam arrived here. It sailed from New Netherland out of the River Mauritius on the 23d of September. They report that our people are in good spirit and live in peace. The women also have borne some children there. They have purchased the Island of Manhattes from the savages for the value of 60 guilders. It is 11,000 morgens in size. Minuit’s Partner: Ellis says Minuit met with “the principal chiefs of nearby tribes.” Gotham argues that it is impossible to say which of the local Lenape tribes Minuit met with. Historian Nathaniel Benchley seems more confident that Minuit was dealing with the Canarsees, a Lenape tribe principally located in south Brooklyn, led by Chief Seyseys. The Canarsees were happy to take whatever the Dutch were offering, Benchley claims, given that the Weckquaesgeeks, a closely related Wappinger tribe, actually occupied most of mid and northern Manhattan Island. Benchley’s theory is one explanation for the Native Americans in question accepted such a low price, and of course turns the whole notion of Europeans exploiting Native Americans on its head. Given the bloody skirmishes fought between Wappinger tribes and New Netherland settlers during the early 1640s (“Kieft’s War”), it’s obvious that not all Native Americans respected whatever deed was signed in 1626. Before Kieft’s War began, these tribes were living comfortably in the outskirts of New Amsterdam, still a tiny settlement with only a few farms north of Wall Street. Lastly, there is a possibility that whoever signed the deal had a sense of the Europeans’ power, and agreed to such a deal out of fear or strategic alliance. We haven’t found any scholarly work pushing this theory, but I’m sure it’s out there, and we’ll adopt it for now. Conclusion: We don’t really know who signed the deal, but it could have been the Canarsees, who didn’t have much of a footprint in Manhattan, rather than the Weckquaesgeeks, who lived north of the Dutch on the island. The Cost: “Sixty guilders” is one of the few hard facts we have to work with. Many a blog post has been spent constructing how much that is worth today. The “$24” figure was first advanced by a historian in 1846. Since then, valuations are all over the map, getting as high as $15,000. To me, this is moot, since we can be pretty sure what the recipient tribes actually received, and it wasn’t an appreciating trust fund. In 1630, the Dutch purchased Staten Island, also for 60 guilders value. A copy of the deed explained that the supplies offered to local chiefs in exchange for unfettered right to the land included kettles, axes, hoes, Jew’s harps (an old instrument), anddrilling awls, the last of which were essential for ramping up the manufacturing of wampum, the shell-beads that made up the local currency. |
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